January was also the warmest such month on record, NASA found, in preliminary data released this weekend by the Goddard Institute for Space Studies (GISS) in New York.

The data, which is subject to adjustment as scientists refine their analysis, shows that the combination of accelerated manmade global warming from the burning of fossil fuels, such as coal and oil, is combining with a record strong El Niño to bump up temperatures to never-before-seen levels since at least 1880.

According to NASA, the global average surface temperature during January was 1.13 degrees Celsius, or 2.3 degrees Fahrenheit above average, compared to the 1951 to 1980 average.

This makes it the first month to exceed 2 degrees Fahrenheit above average. December's global average temperature came in just under this, at 1.11 degrees Celsius above average, which translates to nearly 2 degrees Fahrenheit above normal.

The previous record warm January in NASA's records was January of 2007, when global average temperatures were 0.95 degrees Celsius, or 1.71 degrees Fahrenheit, above average. That year, like 2015, was also an El Niño year.

The period from November through January was the warmest three month period on record, NASA data shows, with an average global temperature of 1.1 degrees Celsius, or 1.95 degrees Fahrenheit, compared to the 20th century average.

Map showing temperature departures from average by latitude, clearly indicating the largest departures in the Arctic, which begins at about 66 degrees North latitude.

Image: NASA GISS

Much of the unusual warmth through the winter so far has been observed across Siberia, much of the Arctic, parts of Central Asia as well as Canada and Alaska.

In the Arctic, above average air temperatures have helped to keep sea ice to record low levels, and a record low sea ice maximum may be set in March.

However, the JMA data shows that January had a slightly lower departure from average compared to December 2015, with the monthly global average temperature anomaly of 0.52 degrees Celsius above the 1981 to 2010 average. This was 0.91 degrees Celsius, or 1.6 degrees Fahrenheit, above the 20th century average.

This was the warmest January since 1891, the JMA found.

According to the JMA, December had a temperature departure from the 20th century average of 1.04 degrees Celsius, or 1.9 degrees Fahrenheit, and November was 0.88 degrees Celsius, or 1.6 degrees Fahrenheit, above the 20th century average.

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), which is the other U.S. agency that tracks global temperatures, also found that January was the warmest such month on record. This makes January 2016 the ninth-straight warmest month on record, NOAA said in a press release on Wednesday.

The NOAA also found that global average land and sea surface temperatures were more than 1.04 degrees Celsius, or 1.87 degrees Fahrenheit, above the 20th century average.

This temperature anomaly was not high enough to set a record, though, possibly owing to the different ways that NOAA and NASA incorporate Arctic weather station data.

El Niño plus manmade warming

No matter what NOAA's rankings turn out to be, though, it's already clear that January, as well as this winter so far, stand out as the most unusually mild period on record since instrument records began in the late 19th century — and very likely long before that.

The El Niño event in the equatorial tropical Pacific Ocean is playing a role in boosting global temperatures, since the presence of unusually mild waters across such a vast and strategic expanse of the Pacific acts as a heat pump, effectively transferring back into the atmosphere some of the excess energy that has built up in the oceans due to global warming and natural processes.

Lest one pin all the blame on El Niño, though, it's noteworthy that no past El Niño year — not even years with El Niño events as strong as this one (the only comparable event occurred in 1997-98) — have come close to the temperature anomalies seen during the past several months.

Simply put, it's easier to set warm temperature records now than it used to be, particularly when manmade forces line up with natural climate variability like El Niño.

Deke Arndt, the director of climate monitoring at NOAA's National Centers for Environmental Information in Asheville, North Carolina, has offered a useful analogy that helps explain the relationship between manmade climate change and El Niño.

Long-term warming is like riding an escalator up over time - it moves you consistently to higher values. El Niño is like jumping up during that trip. You reach new heights when the long-term effects are combined with the short-term jumps," Arndt said in an email to Mashable.

Temperature anomalies during El Niño and non-El Niño years over time.

Image: NOAA/NCEI

"These two factors — long-term warming and El Niño — have worked together to give us this recent run of unprecedented warm months," he wrote.

According to Arndt, each intense El Niño adds about 0.5-degree Fahrenheit to the global temperature during the course of the event, which is less than the 1-degree Fahrenheit of global warming since the early 1980s.

"Where you are on the escalator matters! The decades-long ride on the escalator has moved us significantly further from where we started than any individual El Niño," he wrote.

"But the strong El Niño jump in recent months has helped us separate from even the small pack of previously-warmest-on-record months."

Stefan Rahmstorf, the head of Earth system analysis at the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impacts Research, said the record warmth is "helped along a bit by El Niño, but most of it (more than 80%) is due to human-caused global warming."

"A strong El Niño event can elevate the monthly global temperature by up to 0.2 degrees Celsius," he said in an email.

Rahmstorf continued:

"This January record follows 2015 as the hottest year on record. The second hottest year was 2014, followed by 2010 and 2005. This sequence of new records every few years - and now even two in a row - reflects the ongoing rapid global warming trend. As the El Niño event winds down over the coming months we can expect somewhat lower global temperatures again for a while, but the global warming trend will continue until we phase out fossil fuels."

The lingering influence of El Niño may mean that 2016 will also set an all-time annual temperature record, since the atmospheric effects of El Niño tend to be delayed by several months when compared to the oceanic impacts.

This post was updated on Feb. 17 to include the results of NOAA's global temperature analysis.

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